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Vancouverites are invited to spend the day exploring the six cultural institutions of Vanier Park, at the fourth annual Winter Wander, presented by Port Metro Vancouver.

Vanier Park is home to Vancouver Maritime Museum, Museum of Vancouver, H.R. MacMillan Space Centre, Bard on the Beach Shakespeare Festival, Vancouver Academy of Music, and City of Vancouver Archives. Each year, the group teams up for a one-day event where locals and their families can enjoy a taste of what Vanier Park’s cultural institutions have to offer.

For only $5.00, youth, seniors and adults receive admission to all venues, while kids five and younger can visit for free.

In addition to all the exhibitions, there will be some extra special opportunities to enjoy.

There will be food trucks on site from Triple-O's and Big Red's Poutine, and ventriloquist Kellie Haines will be performing her show at MOV (11:30am and 1:00pm),

Expert face painter Allyson Grant from Gossamer Designs will be adding colour the the festivities, and We Love Van will be providing complimentary water and coffee. Make sure to enter the prize draws too!

We are grateful for the continued generosity of Port Metro Vancouver, whose support will ensure that this year’s event is not to be missed. We would also like to thank our event sponsors City and LG104.3 for spreading the word.

We have received extensive coverage of c̓əsnaʔəm, the city before the city.

Below is a sneak peek of the exhibition at MOV by Dawn Chabai from City's Breakfast Television, or view here:

“We want Vancouverites to recognize that there was a city here before they came,” said Howard E. Grant. “When contact came, historians, archaeologists, and writers, wrote a lot about other tribes but very little written about Musqueam. It is now our time to tell our story.” - Excerpt from the Vancouver Sun: 'Vancouver exhibition at three sites tells the story of Musqueam city on the Fraser' Read more

Below, NovusTV host Maike Evers explores all three exhibitions:

"The key across the project is to re-establish a connection between past and present, to show the continuum between the early Musqueam people and their descendants still here, still looking for justice and recognition." Excerpt from Vancouver Magazine's 'The City Before the City: The Musqueam First Nation'Read more

"Many people think of Vancouver as a "new" city. But long before the gleaming towers, the industry and the traffic was another thriving community called "cesna?em." Watch Jordan Wilson's interview with Gloria Macarenko on Our Vancouver: 'Vancouver's Musqueam past revisited'here and listen to Jordan Wilson give a tour of the original c̓əsnaʔəm site on CBC Early Edition: here click the "Listen" button.

"When guests visit the Museum of Vancouver’s newest exhibit beginning next week, the first thing they will see is a nail protruding from the wall beside its entrance. A Musqueam tradition advises visitors to someone’s home to “hang” any preconceived thoughts on a nail like this so people enter the space with an open mind and an open heart." Excerpt from The Globe and Mail: 'Using traces from Vancouver’s past, a vibrant community is recognized'Read more

"The origins of this city, now lying unseen below the streets of Marpole, date back 4,000 years, and the people who built it have been here even longer." Excerpt from the Westender: 'Groundbreaking, three-part exhibit traces the origins of Vancouver back to its Musqueam roots'Read more

“It’s one of the first times where Musqueam’s really been able to tell our own history in our own words,” said Jordan Wilson, a member of the Musqueam Nation, co-curator of the exhibit at the Museum of Anthropology and part of the curatorial collective for MOV. Excerpt from Vancouver Courier: 'Exhibits bring Musqueam legacy alive'Read more

"The exhibition asks, whose home is Vancouver? How have newcomers claimed Vancouver as their own? How do the Musqueam understand their lengthy connection to this place?" Excerpt from Price Tags: 'c̓əsnaʔəm, the city before the city'Read more

"At all three venues, the didactic components are thoughtfully composed and the exhibition design is handsome and effective. The elements that knit past and present together and that most engage the visitor, however, are the unearthed belongings and the quotes from and interviews with Musqueam elders and other community members." Excerpt from the Georgia Straight: 'c̓əsnaʔəm unburies the city's lost Musqueam world' Read more

"The story of Vancouver is typically told with a gaping hole, leaving out the perspective of the First Nations that called this land home for thousands of years before Europeans arrived." Excerpt from from Vancouver Metro:'New exhibit tells Vancouver’s story through Musqueam First Nation’s eyes'. Read more

“We want to make sure the Musqueam perspective is predominant,” Gosselin says. “Hopefully, when people come in here they don’t think the museum is speaking, but rather Musqueam presenting and representing the community.” Excerpt from Megaphone Magazine: 'Where We Started' Read more

"Our elders tell young people to go slow and be careful, because if something happens to one of us, there is a page in our living history torn out and lost forever." - Morgan Guerin. Excerpt from the Vancouver Observer: 'Can we mend thousands of years of displaced history in Vancouver?' Read more

“People often think of Vancouver as a new city, when in fact it is one of the most significant sites of ancient cultures in Canada – one that has even been compared to other societies such as the Egyptian and Roman societies.” - Terry Point. Excerpt from VanCityBuzz'South Vancouver 5000 Years Ago'Read more

Harkening back to a bygone era: Haunting melodies performed at MOV on January 17th, 2015.

Ever want to escape today’s hustle and bustle to a slower more romantic time? Vocalist Patricia Hammond charmed us with her pre and post war era tunes, bringing a poised and elegant presence to the stage. Patricia and guitar accompanist Budge Schachte have a soulful chemistry — evermore so when it was revealed to the audience that they met in person for the first time the day before!

The first half of this MOV event included a selection of 1940s tunes that brought out the hardships and far away travels of these war times when soldiers left their families and lovers behind. Patricia encouraged the audience to join in with “You’ll get used to it”, “Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye!” and “Will meet again some sunny day”.

After a costume change to a more whimsical dress, appropriate for the 1950s post war era, the second half of the show brought a feeling of letting go with songs such as, “This is my lovely day” and “Enjoy yourself.” “Far away places with strange sounding names” had an emotional resonance that reminded me of adventurous train travels in Europe.

Quite the conversationalist, Patricia revealed her passion for collecting sheet music. She discovered “She wears red feathers and a hootie hootie skirt” at Carillon Music in Vancouver, and performed it for the first time this night, with charm and grace.

Patricia’s 1950s dress had a playful fabric, which swayed as she sang and danced.

She revealed that it was a reproduction designed by Vivien of Holloway, and amusingly mentioned that certain songs tickled the bones of this dress, acting as an “imaginary singing teacher” as she sang.

After the concert, come explore more than 80 garments presented in the gallery spaces from cocktail dresses to jumpsuits to wartime wedding dresses and much more this Saturday, January 17th from 7:00 to 8:30pm at MOV. A cash bar will be available on site to enhance your evening’s enjoyment!

Design Sundays returns to the Museum of Vancouver this November with the series Housing for a Connected City. Part III – Rally for Connection – was held on November 23, 2014 and was facilitated by Jorge Amigo of the #bemyamigo initiative.

Jorge Amigo initiated the session with a presentation on iconic signs and acts of protest from the 20th and 21st Centuries (right up to the concurrent Kinder Morgan protests in Burnaby), and how their images have come to define issues due to their ubiquitous circulation throughout the mass media, exhibitions, and the internet. See example below:

Participants discussed their own histories with protesting, each sharing their successes, failures, motivations and the dangers faced. We then broke off into teams to devise slogans encapsulating desires and attitudes surrounding housing affordability and social connection in Vancouver, spending over an hour and a half of intense planning to flesh them out into engaging visual prototypes.

A key part of the Museum of Vancouver's mission is to strengthen Vancouverites’ personal connections and civic engagement. We believe that connection is critical for resilient communities, sustainability, and health. We are pleased to be partnering this month with Laboratory of Housing Alternatives, Generation Squeeze, marianne amodio architecture studio, THNK School of Creative Leadership, #bemyamigo, and the Vancouver Design Nerds to present the latest iteration of our annual four-part Design Sundays series: Housing for a Connected City.

On the morning of November 8th, the Vancouver Urban Sketchers MeetUp group convened at MOV with their pencils and books in hand, to experience our current fashion exhibition From Rationing to Ravishing - which spans the 1940s and 1950s. Twenty-eight members came out to participate in the event creating many fantastic representations of the exhibition.

Design Sundays returns to the Museum of Vancouver this November with the series Housing for a Connected City. Part II was held on November 16, 2014 with REFRAME: Reframing Housing in Vancouver. This interactive workshop was facilitated by THNK School of Creative Leadership.

Participants worked together in teams of three using a reframing technique as a means of overcoming intellectual barriers impeding our ability to think constructively about problems of affordability in Vancouver’s housing market. By systematically identifying core negative beliefs about housing and affordability, further identifying the beliefs supporting those initial key principals, formulating beliefs in direct opposition to the supporting beliefs in the previous step, and then subsequently summarizing these opposing supporting beliefs to form new core beliefs, fresh perspectives became suddenly and unexpectedly apparent. As one participant summarized during the wrap up, by arguing for points of view we normally wouldn’t identify with, it becomes easier to accept solutions we might otherwise too easily write off as unfeasible. The results were eye opening for those involved, and the exercise allowed us to step outside of repetitive configurations and ways of thinking, aiding us as we move forward and strive for change.

A key part of the Museum of Vancouver's mission is to strengthen Vancouverites’ personal connections and civic engagement. We believe that connection is critical for resilient communities, sustainability, and health. We are pleased to be partnering this month with Laboratory of Housing Alternatives, Generation Squeeze, marianne amodio architecture studio, THNK School of Creative Leadership, #bemyamigo, and the Vancouver Design Nerds to present the latest iteration of our annual four-part Design Sundays series: Housing for a Connected City.

To view all of the artifacts digitized in this project, search the keyword phrase BC Digitization 2014 on openMOV. Here, though, we share a few artifacts that would fit in perfectly with the stunning pieces featured in From Rationing to Ravishing, as well as the stories of the women to whom they belonged.

Born to Hungarian-Jewish parents in 1899, Ibolya (Iby) Koerner became actively involved in community life in Vancouver after arriving with her husband and daughter shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War.

During the war years, Mrs. Koerner was an active volunteer at the Shaughnessy Hospital Red Cross Lodge, as well as a member of the Vancouver Art Gallery Women’s Auxiliary Committee. After the war, she served on the board of the Community Arts Council, later becoming heavily involved with the Vancouver International Festival and the Community Music School, now the Vancouver Academy of Music.

After her death in 1983, a donation of clothing and accessories was made by her estate to the Museum, including this hat. It is representative of the variety of hats Mrs. Koerner would have worn to various charity and cocktail funtions.

Purchased in Vancouver sometime between 1948 and 1955, this hat belong to Miss Nora Nedden. Miss Nedden was born in England in 1903 and educated at a convent in Ireland. She came to Vancouver in the late 1910s to live with an aunt and uncle, Captain and Mrs. Nedden and remained in Vancouver for the rest of her life, save during the Second World War when she served with the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force in the RAF.

Miss Nedden was a noted South Vancouver socialite, active in the Southlands Riding Club and in charitable organizations such as the Alliance Française, CNIB, and St. John’s Anglican Church.

Royal Canadian Air Force handkerchief and mailer, c. 1940-1945: H980.62.2Donor: Miss Jane Rittenhouse

During the Second World War, Jane Rittenhouse joined the WRENS (Women’s Royal Navy Service), working mostly as a supply clerk in Halifax. After working a variety of jobs in Toronto after the war, Ms. Rittenhouse moved to Vancouver, where she began an active volunteer career, working largely within Kitsilano.

For some time, she spent more hours than a full-time work week working on volunteer activities with organizations such as the Kitsilano Neighbourhood Association. She served on the Local Area Planning Committee, the Community Resources Board, and the Parents Book Committee, among others, bringing her expertise to numerous projects such as the development of local day care centres, seniors’ activities, and the production of a Roger's Cable documentary.

It’s likely this handkerchief was one of many mass produced for fundraising purposes. It would have been folded into the mailer and sent to those deployed in service overseas.

From a very early age, Sonja Kraemer adored jewellery, for she saw it as a means to feeling beautiful and being accepted by others. Born in Vancouver in 1958, she moved with her family to rural Richmond when she was six years old. Her mother came from a middle-class family in Germany where the proper clothes and the right appearance and image were very important.

Kraemer was in her early teens, c. 1968-1972, when she began to purchase jewellery for herself; her first purchase was at Woodward's. Between the years of 1980 and 1981, Kraemer worked in a curio shop, "Aleksandra's" where she took jewelry in lieu of a salary until she became a sales clerk. "Aleksandra's" was at 312 W. Hastings Street, Vancouver, until it closed in 1981. Most of the jewelry in this collection came from Aleksandra's.

This brooch features rhinestones with an “aurora borealis” treatment, so called because it gives the stones an iridescent quality similar to the Northern Lights. The treatment was introduced by Swarovski in 1955 and became a very popular trend in 1950s costume jewellery.

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MOV wishes again to thank the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre’s BC History Digitization Program; without their financial support, this project would not have been possible.

Design Sundays returns to the Museum of Vancouver this November with the series Housing for a Connected City. Part I, JUXTAPOSE, was held on the afternoon of Sunday November 9, 2014.

Laboratory of Housing Alternatives board member Alicia Medina introduced the overarching topics of the series, namely housing affordability, loneliness, and social engagement and connectedness – and posed the question to the audience for group discussion: How engaged do I feel in my current living situation?

Paul Kershaw (founder of Generation Squeeze) and architect Marianne Amodio presented on the work they're currently involved with. Kershaw revealed startling statistics that suggest current Federal and Provincial level subsidization policies exclude young Canadians from financial support in areas, such as raising children, that might otherwise indirectly alleviate the pressures of Vancouver housing costs. Amodio detailed recent high density, multi-adult housing projects she's developed that maximize footprints for communal amenities, while keeping private space functional and minimizing underused spaces (foyers, formal dining rooms, etc.) – all without undervaluing the beauty of form. The pair then led an insightful and engaging Q&A session that saw input from a multigenerational audience composed of the likes of students, designers, business owners and even candidates in the current municipal elections. Participation was wide and incredibly considerate of the issues at hand, and had us thinking about investing in what might not normally be considered capital to offset inhospitable economic climates, breaking away from traditional conceptions of home ownership and life achievement; and to closely evaluate the design and context of public space to potentially counteract loneliness and social disengagement.

A key part of the Museum of Vancouver's mission is to strengthen Vancouverites’ personal connections and civic engagement. We believe that connection is critical for resilient communities, sustainability, and health. We are pleased to be partnering this month with Laboratory of Housing Alternatives, Generation Squeeze, marianne amodio architecture studio, THNK School of Creative Leadership, #bemyamigo, and the Vancouver Design Nerds to present the latest iteration of our annual four-part Design Sundays series: Housing for a Connected City.

Monday evening, the Museum of Vancouver played host to the 3rd annual Legacy Awards Dinner that honours individual, families and companies who have shown outstanding vision and commitment to building a city that is ranked as one of the most impressive in the world.

The MOV invited well recognized city historians, urban planners, influencers in the business and philanthropic sector, as well as representatives from the MOV Board of Directors to the selection table. They spent two months reviewing over 50 nominees who have helped mould the city as we know it today and who continue to influence its path to tomorrow.

Grant, the son of former Chief Wendy Grant-John and Councillor Howard E. Grant, was presented with the Emerging City Visionary Award for his work bringing together First Nations and New Immigrants, and forging new relationships between Aboriginal people and the City of Vancouver. Dr. Montaner was recognized with the City Shaper Award for his dedication to HIV/AIDS treatment as prevention, resulting in a decrease in infections and mortality. The MOV Legacy Award was presented to Yosef Wosk for his, and his father’s (Morris J. Wosk) extensive history of philanthropic work, benefitting diverse non-profit organizations, both locally and abroad.

Each of the award winners delivered gracious and moving acceptance speeches. Grant reminded guests of the value of multiculturalism; Montaner urged the public to put pressure on the federal government to adopt the UN AIDS treatment strategy; Yosef Wosk read an insightful poem he wrote specifically for the event, entitled ‘Museum as Matter and Metaphor.’

Museum of Vancouver CEO Nancy Noble explained the significance of the award winners: “At the MOV we see the city as a living artifact, and part of that is recognizing the work that has been done by people to make it what it is today. In this third year of awards we’re really starting to see what incredible minds and initiative we have within our city, and we’re excited to be recognizing this group of honourees for their contributions to our city’s story.”